D23: Toy Story 3!

At the D23 Expo today, John Lasseter announced some of the cast for the upcoming TOY STORY 3. Though we weren't given character names, it was confirmed that Ned Beatty, Jeff Garland, Bonnie Hunt and Whoopi Goldberg would be lending their voices to the film. And for those of you who didn't hear it at Comic Con, we will be seeing...um, hearing Michael Keaton as Ken. We were treated to a short "Access Hollywood" style interview with Mr. Barbie, who seemed a bit miffed that most of the world's Ken doll owners were girls. Yeah, I admit it. I had one. I think that's how most of us figured out what goes where...or, more accurately, what he was missing.

We also got a quick peek at a brand new character called...wait for it...Mr. Pricklepants. (I'm fairly certain that whoever came up with that was already using Mr. Pricklepants as some sort of sick pet name for a sex partner.) The hedgehog in lederhosen will be voiced by Timothy Dalton. I'm sure he's very proud of having that name on his IMDB page.

The audience got to check out the trailer, which showed Andy (voiced again by a now grown up John Morris) heading off to college. His once beloved toys are donated to a preschool, where we see a child stick poor Mr. Potato Head's eyeball up his nose. Buzz Lightyear helps everyone escape, but is damaged in the process. When he is rebooted, he speaks Spanish. (For a few minutes, he's Antonio Banderas.)

D23 is wrapping up as I type this, and right before the screening of TOY STORY 1 & 2 in 3D, they showed us a brand new scene from TOY STORY 3. First the film's director and producer Lee Unkrich and Darla K. Anderson showed us a never-before-seen early animation test of Buzz Lightyear's Spanish persona. (He breaks down during an escape attempt, and he's rebooted in Spanish.) We see Jesse on one side of the screen while Buzz flamenco dances his way over to her. When he finally reaches her, she drags him off...doll sex is implied. It was hysterical.

In the new scene, Andy is being told to clean out his room as he's leaving for college in three days. His sister Molly is moving in and she's teasing him about getting all his stuff. Mom tells Andy to separate his things into items for college, the attic, donation to Sunnyside Day Care, or the trash. Molly throws her Barbie into the donation box, while Hamm calls dibs on her Corvette. When Andy is left alone in his room, he contemplates his box of toys. (I swear, that moment is making me want to dig out all my old teddy bears...I feel so guilty.) He finally throws them all in a garbage bag to be stored in the attic...except for Woody. He gets tossed in a box marked "college".

The bag of toys accidentally gets piled in with the trash bags, and as they're being taken out, Woody leaps out of the box to save them all. He can't quite make it and he calls Buster the dog into the room. Alas, the poor pooch has not aged well, and in one of the funniest sequences (the dog stuff always gets me), the now fat, old Buster falls on top of him, and rolls on his back, fast asleep. Woody manages to get out from under him, run to the window with scissors (I don't think you're supposed to run with those) and slide down the drain pipe to save the others.

Meanwhile, the bagged toys are out waiting for the garbage truck, trying to get out. They try to push their way through with Rex's pointy dinosaur tail. When Woody gets to the bags to cut them out, all we see spill forth is garbage, and the truck is crushing the bags that were already thrown in. What will happen? Will they all die? Will the toys sing songs that make me cry? Sniff. I honestly can't wait for this one. To Infinity and Beyond!!!!! (I'm coming Teddy!)